Nendo Designs a Taste of Color with chocolate-paint for Seibu

Opening a box of chocolates is a ritual filled with anticipation and delight. The Japanese design studio Nendo, captures this thrill in “chocolate-paints,” their recent project for the Japanese specialty department store, Seibu.

A limited edition box of chocolates filled with 12 cordial flavors, “combines the childhood excitement of opening a new box of paints and the thrill of opening a box of chocolates you’ve been given unexpectedly,” explains the studio. The chocolate shells are molded to resemble paint tubes, their sweet liquid filling is indicated by color-coded labels—rum No. 11, melon No. 05, green tea No. 06.

A multidisciplinary design studio led by Oki Sato, Nendo has created a number of wonderful food design projects including the “liptone” mug, the winning design for the Lipton Cup Design Contest (2002), “chocolate-pencils” for patissier Tsujiguchi Hironobu (2007), “forest-spoon” for Japanese curry restaurant chain CoCo Ichibanya (2011) and “bottleware” tableware inspired by Coca-Cola’s classic green bottles (2012).

“Liptone” graphics inspired by Pantone chips.

“chocolate-pencils” can be sharpened, their shavings used to adorn the pastries of chef Tsujiguchi Hironobu

Inspired by the curvature of Coca-cola’s iconic “Georgia Green” bottle, this set of tableware was launched during Design Tide Tokyo

The “forest-spoon” was designed for CoCo Ichibanya “grandmother curry” campaign. 100,000 customers received a spoon through a lottery campaign.